Tuesday, 31 December 2013

Personally it's been good. Apart from a bad bout of food poisoning which wiped most of September and October out we've had another amazing holiday to Orlando and we also moved to our dream house. We love it here SO much.

I've also struggled though. Struggled to make sense of a cruel world. Struggled to know some of my best friends, close friends and fellow bloggers have been going through such unbearably hard times. 2013 has been such a hard year for so many.

I've tried to stay grounded for the sake of Matt and the kids but it's been hard. I've been torn between feeling so low because of all that's happened and trying to make our lives more fun and exciting - creating more memories. I still struggle with this a lot.

The lovely Lucy from Dear Beautiful started Me And Mine at the beginning of the year and I was lucky enough to discover it in April. It's my favourite linky of all time. Such a simple idea but one that makes such you capture complete family moments forever. Memories are what matter and I know that now.

I've thought about quitting on my blog but I just can't. I started this blog as somewhere to document my thoughts, my life, my world. If something was to happen to me I want this little piece of me to live on.

3 years and 420 posts later I'm still here.

I have plans for my blog. Plans to document the life of my kids more. Plans to talk more about our lives, our home, our future. Plans to blog more. Plans to join back in with Silent Sunday. I hope I make those plans a reality.

You know, in 3 years of blogging I've never written about Christmas. Not once.

That makes me feel really sad.

We had a lovely Christmas Day this year. There were 10 of us. Yes, it was hectic. Yes, it was noisy. Yes, it was hard work. But despite this it was lovely. We were two families brought together by Matt and I and the kids. We made some lovely memories that I will treasure.

It was perfect.

I had plans to ask someone to take a family photo of us on Christmas Day but it didn't happen. I forgot in all the busyness of it all. So, these photos were taken yesterday (I know, I know…nothing like leaving it to the last minute!). I've been suffering with a bad cough/cold and MC has had a bad cough too. But we're happy.

They are the last photos of our little family in 2013 so despite them not being perfect to the outside world - they are perfect to me.

Kerry was only 30 years old. A healthy young woman with a husband an 3 small children. Kerry's passing rocked a community. Kerry and I called each other 'blogging sisters' as we started around about the same time. She was one of the friendliest and genuinely lovely bloggers I've ever met. Her passion for her family and her fellow blogging friends was second to none.

It's such a tragedy that her life was cut short so unexpectedly.

I hate to say we don't get a huge amount of time together as a family of four. We see the inlaws pretty much every other weekend and, up until the other month, Matt was playing football every Saturday. It meant we got 2 days a month together where we could spend a day interrupted.

Because Matt works so hard he'd want to spend those 2 days crashing out pretty much. He didn't want to be dashing out all the time and I didn't want to push him too much.

This year has been somewhat different.

Kerry's passing and then the sudden death of Matilda Mae earlier this year have changed me.

It's a change for the better.

Ultimately it was Kerry's comment on my blog that made us book to go back to Orlando this year. It has been Kerry's passing that has pushed me on with my blog. What better way than to leave a diary online for friends, family and, ultimately, your children when they are old enough to read.

Your life, your heart, your memories to be read and remembered for years to come.

I know I don't blog about things as much as I should do right now but we are creating memories and enjoying our time together and that, above all, is what matters.

So this year we've made more time for family frolics. There are too many to mention but…we enjoyed lots of snow, we went away on holiday. We dabbled in some messy play. We moved to a bigger house. We enjoyed the long hot summer. We had picnics out. We went to the cinema. We explored the local area. We went further afield.

But most importantly we made memories.

When we do anything as a family now I cherish the moments so much more. I take more photographs of us a family of 4 than I've ever taken before. I know that making time for family is important.